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Looking around the minimalistic landscape of Arc-en-ciel Pâtisserie, one can see charging points around the place.

With pebble stone flooring, and plants at every corner, the place was designed to resemble a park where the owner, Jiawen, ate her pastries overseas.

The charging points and plants around the cafe make it conducive for people to work or hang out for a while.

What's the food like?

What is unique about this cafe is that Jiawen closely ties her travel stories to the cafe's menu, which changes every three months.

The cafe serves palm-sized cakes and teas, resembling those that you get for high tea.

We tried the “A day in the park” set, available from Jun. 17 to mid-October.

The set, consists of three cakes and three drinks, is priced at S$45 for one pax and S$55 for two pax.

Each cake is paired with a drink that complements its taste.

Paying for two pax would entitle you an extra set of drinks.

The price can be quite steep for relatively small desserts, but you are paying for the cafe's ambience and stories of the cakes.

The cakes featured in "A day in the park" set are all named after people. They can be Jiawen's friends and family, or people she met on her travels.

Something to keep in mind is that the desserts we tried were all tart rather than sweet, which is to the cafe owner’s personal preference.

Cake 1: Claire

Claire is named after a chef in Paris that made a peach tart which inspired this dessert.

It is a white peach raspberry mousse cake that includes white peach, raspberry, redcurrants and macadamia.

The cake is paired with a pink cold tea, the Fruity Peach Cold Brew, which had a strong peach aroma. 

It was the first cake we tried so we did not expect the sourness from the raspberry.

The cake also had a piece of peach place right at the top, giving it a different texture against the soft mousse. (The peachy taste was also surprising to us because we initially thought it was a piece of banana.)

The peach paired nicely with the raspberry flavours, making it a very fruity cake.

The crunchy layer at the bottom was the best part, and the toasty taste of macadamia complemented well with all the fruity flavours. 

Cake 2: Charles

Charles is named after a street in Paris, near the hotel she had a banana lime cake.

It is a lime banana caramel mousse cake which consists of lime, caramel, banana and walnuts.

It also comes with a cold tea, the Grand Cru Breakfast Cold Brew. 

As someone who is not a big fan of tea, it tasted like the usual cold tea.

The tea helps to tone down the lime taste if you're not a big fan of lime.

With ingredients such as banana and caramel, the cake was more sour than expected.

Lime was the most prominent flavour, reminding me of the Solero ice cream. 

Cake 3: Athena

Athena's name is adapted from Hotel Plaza Athénée, where she first had this twist of the usual black forest cake. 

It is a white forest mousse cake which consists of white chocolate, cherry and dark chocolate.

It is a twist on the classic black forest cake and has a milkier white chocolate taste.

This cake tastes the sweetest out of the three that we've tried, with a bit of tartness from the cherry. It was our favourite from the set, maybe because we prefer sweet desserts.

It is paired with a warm lavender citrus tea.

The final hot tea was meant to "wash everything off".

Menu

You can get the cakes in the menu at S$11 a-la-carte.

You can find the menu here:

If you need a place to work or study, and like cute desserts, this may be the place for you.

Details

Location: 37A Neil Rd, Second Floor, Singapore 088822

Opening hours:

Mondays, Wednesdays & Thursdays: 12pm to 5:30pm

Fridays & Saturdays: 12pm to 6:30pm

Sundays: 11:30am to 5:30pm

Closed on Tuesdays

Top photo by Belle Tay